Linear alpha-olefins such as 1-hexene, 1-octene, and like are used in detergents, lubricants, plasticizers, and so on, and in particular, they are widely used as comonomers for controlling the density of a polymer during the preparation of linear low-density polyethylene (LLDPE).
Such linear alpha-olefins were mainly produced through a Shell Higher Olefin Process. However, since the above process synthesizes alpha-olefins of various lengths simultaneously in accordance with Schultz-Flory distribution, there was an inconvenicence of requiring an additional separation step in order to obtain a specific alpha-olefin.
To solve this problem, a method of selectively synthesizing 1-hexene through a trimerization reaction of ethylene or a method of selectively synthesizing 1-octene through a tetramerization reaction of ethylene has been proposed. Further, various studies have been conducted on a catalyst system enabling such selective oligomerization of ethylene.